


Playboy

by Russian_Fic_Store



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Gen, Military, Politics, Time Period: Reign of Yuri Vorbarra, Winterfair
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-05
Updated: 2016-09-05
Packaged: 2018-08-13 06:47:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7966657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Russian_Fic_Store/pseuds/Russian_Fic_Store
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>On Winterfair's Eve gentle officers don’t shun life's simple pleasures, but, as for the Commander of the Guard, it adds to workload.</p><p>Author: jetta_e_rus<br/>Translated from Russian by MollyGrue</p>
            </blockquote>





	Playboy

**Author's Note:**

  * A translation of [Гуляка](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2070744) by [jetta_e_rus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/jetta_e_rus/pseuds/jetta_e_rus). 



A Winterfair's Eve is in its full swing, cheer is in the air both in the capital and in every other godforsaken provincial townlet.

Wine spirits, smoke from oil lamps and cheap kitchen lard fill the air of a honky-tonk. Wenches, dressed, for the occasion of festivity, in sequins and brighter rags, introduce themselves to drinkers, emitting vile perfume reek, which is unable to mask the musky undertone of sweat on hot bodies. Women of honky-tonk, - aka brothel, - have plenty of work today. And, those birds who prefer gay also won’t be left in want of attention.

Here, the officer on the “clean” part can't make up his mind. On one knee he has a wench, - not the worst specimen of the local breed: loose copper hair stick to the sweaty skin, voluptuous bosom readily spills out of the too tight bodice. On his other side, the dick-peddler, rouged no less than the redhead, bends to the VIP, and the officer paws his ass benevolently.

The one sitting opposite to him, also dressed in green uniform, watches this scene with patient boredom. His Colonel bums, - quite a regular occurrence, - and it is Commander of the Guard's business to make sure he comes out unscathed. And the wine is so bad it makes one cringe, but, mulled with spices and fused with Winterfair's cheer, even vinegar would sell out. As for himself, he pretends to drink to a greater degree, rather than gulps this abomination for real.

“Well, which one I should choose, Negri?” the first one asks, shouting over the den's horselaugh and trained squeal of the pinched boy-slut. He knows only two ways to address his Commander of the Guard: by surname or by rank, and the use of the latter one means that the commander is either upset, or the occasion is so strictly official, that... one should revert to Point One of the list. “A Readhead? Or, shall I leave her to you?” He smirks.

Negri watches attentively. The Colonel sits, his movements restrained by the wench on his knees, - he paws her with one hand, and, having released the slut-boy from another, he grabs the half-empty grog mug in his stead. Hence, he would need an extra second to reach for his firearm, if the slut-boy – a new face in this brothel, - would prove to be not the one he was showing himself to be... Still, a heavy clay mug with its hot contents is a weapon in its own right.

From behind the fenestella, pops of firecrackers going off alternate with crackling of ammo tossed into the fire – everyone celebrates Winterfair according to his means and abilities. Negri, being accustomed, does not startle at every blast any more.

“Relax, it's such an occasion... You want a catty-cat? Or a dick?” the Colonel smirks maliciously, paying no heed to the fact that the dialog is sort of one-sided. It's an old game, and a familiar one. “No season for Betan herms, my apologizes. Failed to bring in.”

“I am sick and tired of your binges, Sir,” Negri comments, mentally, as it is not the right time and place to share such an opinion. Besides, his commander knows full well everything his Commander of the Guard has to say on this topic. Binges, irregular, but on a grand scale, stunning promiscuity, and, apparently, almost exhausted luck to escape from the mess unscathed. These are just blossoms coming out, however. Berries will yet have to spout. When, well after midnight, after the Colonel had pawed all that moved and tasted all that he liked, he would stagger through the front door into the snowstorm that had traced the night’s dark with its gusts.

Here it is, the main why of his today’s headache. Fragile silver-grey flyer cabin, state-of-the-art toy of galactic technologies, dangerously vulnerable to an inadvertent shot, able to avert misfortune only thanks to elaborate craftiness of its electronic systems. And, there is greater cunning for every artifice, and each secret code has its decipherer. To Negri's mind, military pilots are all inveterate suicides, and each time his charge – no matter that he is the regiment commander of the Airforce, - takes the control stick without real necessity, the Commander of the Guard feels uncomfortable. Especially because the Colonel renounces autopilot, on principle. “You order your gramma round, after she had a stroke, and, as far as I am concerned, my legs and hands serve me well!” he countered once, enraged by a mere suggestion to exercise more caution and relay the steering to the computer, and then the topic was closed one and for all.

“Let’s hop on the boat, my da-a-rling!” – the Colonel sings with gusto, shakily, but determinedly strolling to the machine through the snowy whirlwinds. It is not a true storm, but unpleasant bumps in flight are guaranteed even to the cautious pilot, and the Colonel can’t be considered such, not in the slightest.

Having learned by experience what sort of somersaults he liked to perform in the air, Negri, once landed, swiped the sweat from his brow, sighed and went to examine the flight instructor’s schedule. To date, he does not like lightflyers, but he studies thoroughly. It is within his duties, naturally, to maintain control over any dangerous circumstance his charge is able to fly into, literally and figuratively. The Colonel’s recklessness means that Negri, himself, must be able to take off, pilot and safely land the machine: half-conscious, wounded, in thunderstorm, - no matter what.

This route is, for sure, far from being the most dangerous one, there is nothing to crash into in open air, if the pilot does not turn to the foot-hill belt on a whim. But in the snowstorm, darkness and godforsaken Winterfair's Night ... A year after the war, the amount of ammo on Barrayar is similar to the number of fleas on dog, and every barn can hide grenade-launcher, and there is a festive fire close to every doorstep, spitting out resinous coals and cracks of gunpowder, which would mask any assassination attempt brilliantly.

“it’s a pity you didn't go for a readhead,” the pilot closes the lid, stretches, and brushes snow from his overcoat. “She has lips, like... mmmph... Then you won't be such a spoilsport now.”

Negri pays heed not to his words, - to the sounds. Button clicks, - flaps downed, soft purr – it’s the engine warms up at idle, a flap – high boot's sole rests on the parking brake, high pitched noise, - revved up the engine...

“If you liked her, might have hooked her for the night as well”, he surmises, despairingly. No way to outsmart the one, who is ten years older than you, smarter than you, three grades outranks you, titles aside. “Fireworks would be over then, the snowstorm would wane, we would have flied normally.”

“Sure thing”, - his counterpart winks. The machine takes off the land, jiggling. “And wait then, for one more year till the next Winterfair comes? Stop grumbling. Once back to the base, - so be it, I’ll let you lament your sorry lot over a beer to your fellow officers. Spill it, that your commanding officer is a bummer, womanizer and a roadhog, - no chance to follow, dratty job. You think, I am not aware?

He is uncharacteristically talkative today. And unusually benevolent, just as much.

“Me, - and blabbing about you? You jest?” Negri allows himself to smile.

“ I jest.” the Colonel nods. The talk does not distract him from his piloting, which is habitual to the point of reflectory in his case. Negri has long promised himself that he would achieve the same ease in piloting, but, as he had been sincerely advised, he really needed more exercise hours to reach this goal. “Well, if you don’t, then someone else does. “Once sozzled, he has just one thought in mind, and it is on tumbling with the wenches. In lightflyers. Or, not in lightflyers. Or, not with wenches. Rackety mug.” They say so, right?”

It's a rhetorical question. Negri keeps delicately silent, feeling no urge to advice his superior on the exact wording, which is, in truth, much more pictorial, briefer and less socially approved. The straightforwardness of barrack-room slang is no news either to himself or to the Colonel.

“And, is it true, what they say...” the one at the control stick communicates, “You won't pass for a girl, sure...”

He revs up the engine and pulls the stick with one slick and short movement. It catches one's breath, when the flyer enters a loop, and the passenger has barely a moment to grab at the elbow rests and stifle an indignant growl, scandalized by the unprovoked mischief. My, such a strong argument for a dispute!

“I am your Commander of the Guard, Sir” he informs, almost petulantly, when the jet rights the list. For Negri to address his boss as “Sir” in private is yet more seldom than to be addressed as “Lieutenant”. There is something special between these two, most easily characterized as “friendship”, if not for the drastic difference in their status and the fact that both are disinclined to spend pompous words.

“Commander of the Guard, yep,” another consents. “So, it is your job to keep me out of trouble, to ensure I sit flat on my ass, safe, do not fly, do not associate with wenches of dubious character and drink only boiled water, right?” The Colonel's words brim with irony.

“Right, sort of, so what?” Negri gives his commander a questioning look. There is a trap laid someplace among this irony, but where exactly is it?

“An order will soon come from the capital for my promotion.” the Colonel informs, casually. “The rank of General and a Green army to command. I am still a fucking Prince, if only a forty-second cousin, and I am due no less.” He swings his hand.

“Congratulations,” Negri says, politely. There is nothing special in another promotion, though, for sure, they really happen too quick, - but, considering his commander's pedigree...

The Colonel Ezar Vorbarra watches him soberly through narrow lids and pronounces distinctly:

“My Royal Cousin deemed possible to give me an army, despite the fact that he does not condone excessive frivolity of my behavior, seeing me as a martinet, a bummer and the one indecently disinterested in all things Vor. You will get the post of my Security Chief. Do you understand, what tasks fall to personal guards, and what fall for security service, Negri? And what sort of drafts you would have to protect me from, Captain?"

That's a knockout.

“I understand, Sir.” the prospective Security Chief answers, after a long pause, and this time his short phrase is filled not with pique but with respect. For a lesson.

Bad reputation may be not only a burden, but a defense, right? The young emperor is paranoidally suspicious, and it may be more dangerous to invoke his scrutiny rather than catch a random shot in the air. That's why it is so important to appear an unworthy target. Loose fish, jovial, promiscuous, with no interest either in politics or in capital life...

This very moment Negri comprehends the peculiarities of high politics not better than he used to understand flyer piloting a year ago. But he can learn. And that's what he will do – starting immediately.

“Settled, then.” The Colonel, – a Colonel yet, – nods and smiles. “Listen to the battle plan. We fly nice to the airport and make some flips there.” He laughs, “Right like I've tumbled this evening. Ah, such a pity that you’ve refused!”


End file.
